Archive/File: people/i/irving.david/libel.suit/transcripts/day024.11
Last-Modified: 2000/07/24
MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes. Mr Irving, have you got N1? Were you
able to follow all that?
MR IRVING: I am going with your Lordship's view that what Hans
Frank's use of the word means is really not of much
relevance, having gone to all that trouble.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: The way it is put is, and just decide whether
you want to ask a question, is that Frank had just come
back from Berlin where he had heard Hitler speaking, so he
is not harking back in all of what he says to 1939 but to
four days before.
MR IRVING: Yes.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think the way it is put is that vernichtung
is used fairly unambiguously in Frank's speech as a record
. P-93
of what he had been told in Berlin. It is really that one
phrase, is it not, Dr Longerich? "In Berlin we were told
why all this trouble, we cannot use them in the Ostland or
the Reichskommissariat either, liquidate them yourselves"?
A. Yes. That is I think the main paragraph, the main
sentence.
Q. It may be that you do not want to cross-examine about
that, Mr Irving?
MR IRVING: Not really, because it is not the word vernichtung
unfortunately.
A. It is the words Juden vernichtung. That is in there, in
the German text. (German spoken). The term vernichtung
the term vernichtung is clearly in here. When he is not
sure about the means how to vernichtung the people, he is
saying we cannot liquidate, we cannot execute them, we
cannot poison them, so what shall we do?
MR IRVING: That is the problem we have with that particular
passage, of course, my Lord, is it not Frank says earlier,
we cannot poison them, we cannot shoot them.
A. Yes. We are looking -- this is on page bold 7, second
paragraph. So they are looking for a kind of solution,
how to vernichtung the people.
MR IRVING: Without shooting or poisoning them?
A. Yes. Poisoning could be a possible method. They are
looking for a kind of solution to this problem and then it
is explained here that we will have a meeting in Berlin,
. P-94
and this is obviously the Wannsee conference. Then it
becomes clearer what would happen in the
Generalgouvernement.
Q. If you went back to the Klauserwitz example and somebody
said to a German general, we have Eisenhower's armies in
front of us, we cannot shoot them, we cannot poison them,
how are we going to destroy them? The answer is, cut off
their water supply, cut off the power, deprive them of the
shipping lines, the oil. There are all sorts of ways of
destroying an enemy.
A. That is why I am trying to explain how difficult it is to
make comparisons because clearly von Klauserwitz is
referring to an army, and in your example you refer to an
army, but here it is about the Jews.
Q. An enemy?
A. An enemy, but the Jews are the Jews. This is the people,
the human beings, and if I destroy, vernichtung, human
beings, and I discuss then the methods, whether I should
liquidate them, execute them or whether I should poison
them, I think then the context is pretty clear. There is
not much room for interpretation, I think.
Q. Dr Longerich, it is even clearer than that because he
says, we cannot shoot them and we cannot poison them.
A. Yes, because they have not been told from Berlin what
method they should use. Then, if you into the Wannsee
protocol, actually the suggestion comes from von Below,
. P-95
they had the Secretary of State, "We could like to deal
with the Jews on the spot, we do not want to send them to
the East, we would like to do it here". Then it goes on
in the Wannsee protocol. The various methods were
discussed how to solve the problem. Then they were
discussing what to do, poisoning, gassing, probably
executions. This is preWannsee. He was sure that they
were going to vernichtung the Juden, because it came back
from Berlin and heard the speech, but the method was unclear.
Q. You are not suggesting, although I am sure you quite
accidentally gave the opposite impression, that in the
Wannsee protocol there is any reference to killing at all, is there?
A. I do not know whether we will go to the Wannsee conference
in more detail.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: The problem with all of this is that it is
not Mr Irving's fault at all, because he has been
confronted with this glossary and I can understand why he
is going through it, but to me it is unhelpful, this whole
exercise. We are coming across odd documents from 39 or 35 or 43.
MR IRVING: Rather the same thing happened with the previous
witness, my Lord. We came across topics that the witness
urgently wanted to talk about and which no doubt will get
raised later on.
. P-96
MR JUSTICE GRAY: I think it is better to look at these words
when we come across them in the context of examining the
substantive issues rather than having a kind of linquistic
sequence of questions.
MR IRVING: That would be the other way of slicing the same cake.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: I know it would. I say again -- it is not
intended critically of you at all -- that darting from
one document to another is not I think particularly helpful.
MR IRVING: I am very rapidly going through the remaining part
of the glossary to see if there are any important points
to take. The fact that Robert Lie used a word a certain
way does not mean to say necessarily that that was the
standard meaning of the word?
A. I am only referring to Lie. He was one of the top Nazis
and he used the term in a quite open way. I find our
discussion quite interesting but ----
Q. Very well. In that case that finishes the with the
glossary I think. I may wish to come back to it. Dealing
now with your first report, Dr Longerich, page 10, you say
there in your opening sentence that there can be no doubt
that Hitler's behaviour during his entire political career
was characterised radical anti-Semitism.
A. Yes.
Q. Was he always an anti-Semite, in your view, or did it come
. P-97
upon him in his youth?
A. I think this way of radical anti-Semitism, which means
that he wants to basically remove the Jews from, let us
say, German soil, I think this is a product of the First
World War and appeared immediately after the First World
War. Other historians would argue that actually he learnt
this in Vienna, but I think one has more to emphasise.
Q. There have been all sorts of weird theories, have there
not, about where it came from?
A. Yes, there are all kinds of theories. I think we are on
safer ground if we look at the period after the First World War.
Q. Were all the top Nazi leadership equal in their
anti-Semitism, or were some more anti-Semitic than
others? Were some more motivated than others?
A. Quite clearly some more anti-Semitic than others.
Q. Some were more homicidally anti-Semitic than others?
A. Yes.
Q. Obviously you have worked for 20 years now in the records
so you must have gained some impression that you can tell
us about, the kind of league table of anti-Semitism.
Would Martin Bormann be high up the list of anti-Semitism
as an active anti-Semite?
A. Absolutely, yes. Definitely.
Q. Dr Josef Goebbels, would he be more or less anti- Semitic
than Bormann?
. P-98
A. I have never thought about a kind of hierarchy, but
I think, if you look at the top Nazis, I think you can
fairly say that radical anti-Semites, people who wanted to
remove by any means the Jews from Germany, I think you
would count among them Hitler, Himmler, Goebbels, Bormann,
I think, and some others.
Q. Hermann Goring, for example, was always getting in trouble
because he had Jewish friends, did he not?
A. Yes, but the fact that one has Jewish friends does not
necessarily exclude that one can be an anti-Semite or even
a radical anti-Semite. I think probably Goring looked at
this more from a kind of political or tactical point of
view. I am not sure. I think the anti-Semitism of Goring
and his role in the Final Solution has not been fully
researched. That is all I can say to that.
Q. Goebbels was the real mover and shaker, was he not? He
was the propagandist, he was the little poison dwarf, the
evil genius?
A. He was definitely a radical anti-Semite, and he was trying
to push forward anti-Semitic policy, this is right, but
I would not make a kind of hierarchy where I would place
Goebbels at the top.
Q. The reason why I am asking this is this. Goebbels, for
example, would never have dreamed of employing a Jew on
his staff or a half Jew on his staff, would he? I do not
think he did.
. P-99
A. I cannot say anything about his dreams, but I think he did
not, as far as I know.
Q. That is an English expression. Adolf Hitler of course did
have some half Jews on his staff, did he not?
A. I do not know. I cannot recall any names. Hitler?
Q. Yes. His private chauffeur, Emile Morris. When it turned
out that Emile Morris was Jewish, did not Hitler protect
him and keep him on to the end?
A. I cannot recall this.
Q. Do you know Peter Hofmann, Professor Peter Hofmann?
A. Yes.
Q. He is a well-known Canadian German historian, is he not?
A. Yes.
Q. Have you read his book, Hitler's Personal Security?
A. I know the book but I cannot recall this detail. I simply
do not know.
Q. Does it not strike you as odd that an anti-Semite like
Hitler would not mind having a Jewish chauffeur, Emile Morris?
A. I cannot comment on this story. I do not know whether it
was an established fact that Morris was a Jew. I cannot
comment on that. Again I would say, if you look into the
history of anti-Semitism, the greatest anti-Semites had
sometimes Jewish friends. They would say, well, this is
my friend, he is an exception, he is not like others.
This is a typical stereotype.
. P-100
Q. You are damned if you do and damned if you do not, effectively?
A. It is a typical stereotype. I do not think one can draw
major conclusions from the fact that somebody protected a
Jew or had Jewish friends.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: Just pause a moment, Dr Longerich.
MR RAMPTON: Can I say something? I am not criticising
Mr Irving in the very least for having gone through that
glossary, and he did it really rather quickly, but I am a
bit concerned now because Mr Irving conceded one question
and answer to the effect, I think, that Hitler was from
1919 onwards a profound anti-Semite and that anti-Semitism
was one of the important planks of Nazi ideology.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: So, in the early years you say that this is
really not an issue?
MR RAMPTON: I have made it specific. From 1919 onwards and
that anti-Semitism became an important plank of Nazi
ideology or policy call it what you like.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: Adding the rider that, as far as Hitler
personally was concerned, he had other things on his mind
from about the invasion of Russia.
MR RAMPTON: He may have had other things on his mind. Being
an anti-Semite is not exclusive of other things.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: No, but I think Mr Irving's case, and he will
correct me if I am wrong, is that anti-Semitism was not
really something that was concerning Hitler from -- am
. P-101
I right about this -- about 1941 onwards, because he was
fairly preoccupied.
MR RAMPTON: No. He said from the time he came to power. From 1933.
MR JUSTICE GRAY: You tell me, Mr Irving. Have I misunderstood your case?
MR RAMPTON: I have misunderstood Mr Irving's concession, if
that be right.

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